Posts Tagged ‘New Mexico’

Nathaniel Jouett, accused of fatally shooting two workers inside a public library and wounding four others, enters a courtroom in Clovis, N.M., Thursday, Aug. 31, 2017. Jouett, 16, faces multiple charges of first-degree murder, assault, aggravated battery and child abuse stemming from Monday’s shooting inside the library in Clovis. Prosecutors have said they will seek to have Jouett, tried as an adult. The Associated Press generally does not identify juveniles accused of crimes. It is identifying Jouett because of the seriousness of the crime and because authorities seek to prosecute him as an adult. (Tony Bullocks/Eastern New Mexico News via AP)

Alexis Molina took a bullet to the chest, just above her heart, and was shot once in each leg as a gunman opened fire inside a public library in New Mexico. But trauma surgeons at the Texas hospital where she is recovering said Thursday that all she could think about was making sure her little brother was safe.

The doctors told reporters that Molina, 20, is expected to make a full recovery, and they described her and fellow library patron Howard Jones as heroes.

Jones, who was at the library with his granddaughter, was shot in the arm. The bullet traveled from his forearm along his radial nerve before lodging in the back of his arm, the doctors said.

Dr. Sharmila Dissanaike, assistant medical director of the trauma center at Lubbock’s University Medical Center, said she was able to talk with both Molina and Jones after they were stabilized. They were not worried about their own futures but more about their loved ones making it to safety, she said.

“They really are heroes. They both saved the lives of other young people who were in that library,” Dissanaike said, without going into detail.

Gunfire erupted inside the Clovis-Carver Public Library on Monday. Two library workers were killed as parents, children and others hid under tables or behind closed doors.

In addition to Molina and Jones, another library worker was shot in the arm and Molina’s 10-year-old brother was injured. The doctors said all four were expected to recover.

Alexis Molina still has a bullet lodged in her leg and the trajectory of the bullet that nearly missed her heart caused other injuries, the doctors said.

“It’s a miracle that she’s alive,” Dissanaike said.

The suspect, 16-year-old Nathaniel Jouett, was ordered to remain in custody during a detention hearing Thursday. Prosecutors argued that he posed a threat to himself and others.

Jouett’s lawyer, Jennifer Birmingham, did not oppose the request.

Jouett has been charged with first-degree murder, assault, aggravated battery and child abuse stemming from the shooting at the library in Clovis, a rural community near the Texas state line.

Prosecutors said suicide notes were found at the teen’s home, and the youth’s pastor also has said Jouett contemplated suicide several months earlier.

Prosecutors say they will seek to have Jouett, a school sophomore, tried as an adult. They planned to file paperwork formalizing the request Friday.

Jouett told investigators he had been thinking “bad things” for some time and initially planned to target his school because he was angry, court documents said.

He was on a two-day suspension from Clovis High School and the pastor, David Stevens, has said that Jouett said he had fought back after another boy hit him.

The teen said he didn’t know why he went to the library and that he didn’t know the victims, records say.

Jouett’s father called Clovis police when he discovered two handguns missing and reported his son missing, but the shooting had already happened.

Asked by investigators what Nathaniel Jouett was thinking during the shooting, he said, “I was mad.”

According to court documents, Jouett saw a woman lying on the ground as he was escorted away and later asked an investigator why no one had helped her. The investigator asked him to think about it for a moment.

Jouett answered, “I feel awful. I don’t like hurting people.”

The teen also said during the interview that no one liked him and he had thought he would kill himself or “kill a bunch of people,” the court records said.

Jouett told investigators he did not want to tell his family, his girlfriend or his friends at the Living Word Church of God about what he had been thinking of doing because he “knew it was wrong,” the records stated.

The Associated Press generally does not identify juveniles accused of crimes. It is identifying Jouett because of the seriousness of the crime and because authorities plan to prosecute him as an adult.

Companies say they are struggling to make decisions as Congress and White House wrangle over health care

Harland Stanley of Louisville, Ky. has an Anthem health-insurance plan, and Anthem has proposed an average rate increase of about 30%.PHOTO: JESSICA EBELHAR FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

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By Anna Wilde Mathews and Louise Radnofsky
The Wall Street Journal

Aug. 1, 2017 8:19 p.m. ET

Major health insurers in some states are seeking increases as high as 30% or more for premiums on 2018 Affordable Care Act plans, according to new federal data that provide the broadest view so far of the turmoil across exchanges as companies try to anticipate Trump administration policies.

Big insurers in Idaho, West Virginia, South Carolina, Iowa and Wyoming are seeking to raise premiums by averages close to 30% or more, according to preliminary rate requests published Tuesday by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Major marketplace players in New Mexico, Tennessee, North Dakota and Hawaii indicated they were looking for average increases of 20% or more.

In other cases, insurers are looking for more limited premium increases for the suites of products they offer in individual states, reflecting the variety of situations in different markets. Health Care Service Corp., a huge exchange player in five states, filed for average increases including 8.3% in Oklahoma, 23.6% in Texas, and 16% in Illinois.

Together the filings show the uncertainty in the health-insurance marketplaces as insurers around the U.S. try to make decisions about rates and participation for next year amid open questions about changes that could come from the Trump administration and Congress.

Insurers face a mid-August deadline for completing their rates. The companies have until late September to sign federal agreements to offer plans in 2018. In some cases, insurers warn, the figures revealed by federal regulators may not reflect their up-to-date thinking.

Insurers are also concerned about whether the Trump administration will enforce the requirement for most people to have insurance coverage, which industry officials say helps hold down rates by prodding young, healthy people to sign up for plans.

In Montana, Health Care Service linked 17 percentage points of its 23% rate increase request to concerns about the cost-sharing payments and enforcement of the mandate that requires everyone to purchase insurance. Kurt Kossen, a senior vice president at Health Care Service, said the company’s rate requests are driven by causes including growing health costs and “uncertainty and the associated risks that exist within this marketplace, including uncertainty around issues like the continued funding of [cost-sharing payments] and mechanisms that encourage broad and continuous coverage.”

Sen. Lamar Alexander (R., Tenn.), who chairs the Senate committee that oversees health policy, said Tuesday that he had told Mr. Trump directly that the government should continue making the payments to insurance companies

The effect of the rate increases will be blunted for many exchange enrollees, because lower-income people receive federal subsidies that cover much of their premiums.

But increases could be tough to stomach for those who aren’t eligible for the help, like Harland Stanley, 53, of Louisville, Ky. Mr. Stanley, who owns his own research business, pays about $400 a month for a plan from AnthemInc., which is seeking an average increase of 34% in the state, though Mr. Stanley’s own premiums might rise by less or more than that.

“It’s going to hurt,” said Mr. Stanley, who said his monthly premium this year is about $120 more than he paid in 2016. “I worry about, what if it keeps going? When is this going to stop?”

Anthem, which is seeking rate average increases of 30% or more in states including Colorado, Kentucky, Nevada and Virginia, has said it would refile for bigger hikes and may pull back its exchange offerings more if uncertainty continues around issues including the cost-sharing payments.

CenteneCorp.’s requests ranged from less than 1% in New Hampshire to 21% in Texas and 12.49% in Georgia. Those rate proposals generally assume the current rules surrounding ACA plans continue, the company said.

Within the marketplaces, “there is relative stability,” said Chief Executive Michael F. Neidorff. “The uncertainty is driven by these policies on the ACA.”

CareSource, a nonprofit insurer that offers exchange plans in four states, has prepared alternate rate filings for different scenarios, and one of its state regulators Monday asked it to refile with proposed rates that assume no cost-sharing payments.

“It’s challenging; you learn to be very fluid,” said Steve Ringel, president of the Ohio market for CareSource. According to actuarial firm Milliman Inc., at least seven states have made similar requests in the past week, while others had earlier asked for two versions of rate filings.

“Resolution of the [cost-sharing payments] is an urgent issue,” said Bill Wehrle, a vice president at Kaiser Permanente, which offers exchange plans in a number of states. “We’re coming up at a point that’s fairly soon, where the pricing decisions we make are set for all of next year.”

The impact of potentially losing the cost-sharing payments was also clear in the rates requested by Blue Cross of Idaho, which average 28%. That would probably be in the lower teens if the payments were guaranteed, said Dave Jeppesen, a senior vice president. “It’s a big swing,” he said. “There’s a lot of risk associated with the uncertainty in Congress right now, and we are pricing appropriately for that risk.”

A recent Kaiser Family Foundation analysis found insurers’ financial results on exchange plans improved in the first quarter of this year, a sign of potentially emerging stability in the business. That is reflected in a number of states where rate-increase requests are limited. The exchange in California said Tuesday that insurers there were seeking an overall average increase of 12.5%—but there would be an additional 12.4% boost layered onto middle-tier “silver” plans if the cost-sharing subsidies aren’t paid.

However, in a number of cases, insurers’ rate requests are well above 20% because of market factors not directly tied to the federal uncertainty. Anthem has warned that it may need to add 18% to 20% to its existing rate requests if the cost-sharing payments aren’t locked in, and it may pull back in more states beyond the five exchanges where it has disclosed plans to leave or sharply reduce its footprint. An Anthem spokeswoman declined to comment on the company’s rate filings.

In Iowa, Medica said its rate increase request was 43.5%, driven by the dynamics of the local market, including the departure of other insurers and the fact that Medica itself has been losing money because enrollees’ health costs ran higher than expected. “You have some element of catching up to what the claims experience is,” says Geoff Bartsh, a Medica vice president.

Medica’s requests in other states have been far lower, he said, a sign of increased steadiness in those markets. But, he said, if the cost-sharing payments go away, Medica estimates it will need to add around 13% to 19% to its rate requests.

WASHINGTON—Senate Republicans made clear on Tuesday that they want to chart their own course to focus on a tax overhaul and critical fiscal legislation, bypassing requests from President Donald Trump and White House officials to keep health care their top legislative priority.

In his first press conference since a GOP health bill collapsed in the Senate, Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R., Ky.) on Tuesday left health legislation off the list of items to be voted on before the chamber leaves for recess later this month, despite Mr. Trump’s calls for the Senate to dive back in.

Mr. McConnell, who has said he prefers to keep disagreements with the president private, also disclosed that he had told Mr. Trump that most senators don’t support changing the chamber’s rules to allow bills to pass on a simple majority vote, as the president urged on Twitter several times in the past week.

“There are not the votes in the Senate, as I’ve said repeatedly to the president and all of you, to change the rules of the Senate,” Mr. McConnell said.

Mr. McConnell was one of several senators in recent days who have resisted White House entreaties on health care, often expressed in language that is frank for leaders of the same party.

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Sen. John Cornyn (R., Texas) took a shot at White House Budget Director Mick Mulvaney, who said Sunday that Congress should continue to work on health care rather than move on to other issues.

“I don’t think he’s got much experience in the Senate, as I recall,” Mr. Cornyn told reporters on Monday night about Mr. Mulvaney, who served three terms in the House. “He’s got a big job. He ought to do that job and let us do our job.”

A spokesman for the Office of Management and Budget said Mr. Mulvaney was merely conveying Mr. Trump’s view. “Health care is a priority for most Americans,” the spokesman said. “It should be for Congress as well.”

In an effort to keep the health-care effort front and center, Mr. Trump has threatened to take away government contributions toward the cost of lawmakers’ health care and to stop government payments to insurers that reduce copayments and deductibles for some of the poorest customers under the 2010 health law. Mr. Trump also has ousted White House staffers most closely linked to the Republican National Committee and the House leadership—former Chief of Staff Reince Priebus and spokesman Sean Spicer —as part of a staff shake-up.

Potentially rebuffing Mr. Trump’s plans, Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee Chairman Lamar Alexander (R., Tenn.) said Tuesday that his committee would begin drafting legislation this week to stabilize the Affordable Care Act’s fragile insurance markets, where people who don’t get health coverage through work purchase insurance. He said the committee aims to pass short-term legislation in mid-September.

For its part, the White House on Tuesday rejected a suggestion made at the White House press briefing that Mr. Trump’s agenda was suffering because he was losing credibility on Capitol Hill.

Next on the Senate Republicans’ agenda is a tax overhaul. “We began to discuss today at lunch tax reform,” Sen. Bob Corker (R., Tenn.) said Tuesday. “That’s our next agenda item, and it’s something that regardless of who’s president we would want to be pursuing at this time.”

Senate and House Republicans plan to advance the issue in September after their recess and have been working with administration officials on a coordinated plan. But Senate Republicans also dismissed White House suggestions they take input from Democrats.

“I don’t think this is going to be 1986, when you had a bipartisan effort to scrub the code,” Mr. McConnell said.

Mr. Trump retains some support in Congress, despite the differences over legislative priorities in the Senate.

“He doubted Congress could repeal and replace Obamacare with no Democrat help,” said Rep. Chris Collins (R., N.Y.), one of Mr. Trump’s earliest supporters. “He was right, so Donald Trump’s not wearing this at all.”

Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, Mr. Trump’s rival for the 2016 GOP presidential nomination, agrees with his call to end the cost-sharing payments to insurers. “The answer is not simply to pass a bailout for insurance companies,” Mr. Cruz said. “That would be a mistake. It’s what the Democrats want.”

Congress also must pass legislation to fund the government beyond Sept. 30, when the current spending law expires, and it needs to raise the borrowing limit by the end of September.

The Treasury has been resorting to cash-management techniques in order to keep paying its bills, but its cash balance is expected to drop to near $25 billion in September, a precariously low level.

Some conservative Republicans have in the past demanded budget concessions in return for voting to raise the debt ceiling. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin met early Tuesday with Mr. McConnell and Sen. Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.), the top Senate Democrat, to urge Congress to raise the debt ceiling with no strings attached, according to aides. Mr. McConnell told reporters he was committed to raising the borrowing limit “to make sure America continues to never, ever default.”

Democrats are holding back on entering negotiations on the debt ceiling until Republicans take a position on whether they will to attach conditions on an increase.

“They’ve got to make some decisions themselves about how they’re going to handle it,” Sen. Ron Wyden, an Oregon Democrat, said. “The leader, of course, is the executive branch.”

The Trump administration is considering a proposal to mobilize as many as 100,000 National Guard troops to round up unauthorized immigrants, including millions living nowhere near the Mexico border, according to a draft memo obtained by The Associated Press.

The 11-page document calls for the unprecedented militarization of immigration enforcement as far north as Portland, Oregon, and as far east as New Orleans, Louisiana.

Four states that border on Mexico are included in the proposal — California, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas — but it also encompasses seven states contiguous to those four — Oregon, Nevada, Utah, Colorado, Oklahoma, Arkansas and Louisiana.

White House spokesman Sean Spicer said the AP report was “100 percent not sure” and “irresponsible.” ”There is no effort at all to utilize the National Guard to round up unauthorized immigrants,” he said.

Governors in the 11 states would have a choice whether to have their guard troops participate, according to the memo, written by U.S. Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly, a retired four-star Marine general.

While National Guard personnel have been used to assist with immigration-related missions on the U.S.-Mexico border before, they have never been used as broadly or as far north.

The memo is addressed to the then-acting heads of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and U.S. Customs and Border Protection. It would serve as guidance to implement the wide-ranging executive order on immigration and border security that President Donald Trump signed Jan. 25. Such memos are routinely issued to supplement executive orders.

Also dated Jan. 25, the draft memo says participating troops would be authorized “to perform the functions of an immigration officer in relation to the investigation, apprehension and detention of aliens in the United States.” It describes how the troops would be activated under a revived state-federal partnership program, and states that personnel would be authorized to conduct searches and identify and arrest any unauthorized immigrants.

Requests to the White House and the Department of Homeland Security for comment and a status report on the proposal were not answered.

The draft document has circulated among DHS staff over the last two weeks. As recently as Friday, staffers in several different offices reported discussions were underway.

If implemented, the impact could be significant. Nearly one-half of the 11.1 million people residing in the U.S. without authorization live in the 11 states, according to Pew Research Center estimates based on 2014 Census data.

Use of National Guard troops would greatly increase the number of immigrants targeted in one of Trump’s executive orders last month, which expanded the definition of who could be considered a criminal and therefore a potential target for deportation. That order also allows immigration agents to prioritize removing anyone who has “committed acts that constitute a chargeable criminal offense.”

Under current rules, even if the proposal is implemented, there would not be immediate mass deportations. Those with existing deportation orders could be sent back to their countries of origin without additional court proceedings. But deportation orders generally would be needed for most other unauthorized immigrants.

The troops would not be nationalized, remaining under state control.

Spokespeople for the governors of Arizona, Utah, Nevada, California, Colorado, Oklahoma, Oregon and New Mexico said they were unaware of the proposal, and either declined to comment or said it was premature to discuss whether they would participate. The other three states did not immediately respond to the AP.

The proposal would extend the federal-local partnership program that President Barack Obama’s administration began scaling back in 2012 to address complaints that it promoted racial profiling.

The 287(g) program, which Trump included in his immigration executive order, gives local police, sheriff’s deputies and state troopers the authority to assist in the detection of immigrants who are in the U.S. illegally as a regular part of their law enforcement duties on the streets and in jails.

The draft memo also mentions other items included in Trump’s executive order, including the hiring of an additional 5,000 border agents, which needs financing from Congress, and his campaign promise to build a wall between the U.S. and Mexico.

The signed order contained no mention of the possible use of state National Guard troops.

According to the draft memo, the militarization effort would be proactive, specifically empowering Guard troops to solely carry out immigration enforcement, not as an add-on the way local law enforcement is used in the program.

In addition to responding to natural or man-made disasters or for military protection of the population or critical infrastructure, state Guard forces have been used to assist with immigration-related tasks on the U.S.-Mexico border, including the construction of fences.

In the mid-2000s, President George W. Bush twice deployed Guard troops on the border to focus on non-law enforcement duties to help augment the Border Patrol as it bolstered its ranks. And in 2010, then-Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer announced a border security plan that included Guard reconnaissance, aerial patrolling and military exercises.

In July 2014, then-Texas Gov. Rick Perry ordered 1,000 National Guard troops to the border when the surge of migrant children fleeing violence in Central America overwhelmed U.S. officials responsible for their care. The Guard troops’ stated role on the border at the time was to provide extra sets of eyes but not make arrests.

Bush initiated the federal 287(g) program — named for a section of a 1996 immigration law — to allow specially trained local law enforcement officials to participate in immigration enforcement on the streets and check whether people held in local jails were in the country illegally. ICE trained and certified roughly 1,600 officers to carry out those checks from 2006 to 2015.

The memo describes the program as a “highly successful force multiplier” that identified more than 402,000 “removable aliens.”

But federal watchdogs were critical of how DHS ran the program, saying it was poorly supervised and provided insufficient training to officers, including on civil rights law. Obama phased out all the arrest power agreements in 2013 to instead focus on deporting recent border crossers and immigrants in the country illegally who posed a safety or national security threat.

Trump’s immigration strategy emerges as detentions at the nation’s southern border are down significantly from levels seen in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Last year, the arrest tally was the fifth-lowest since 1972. Deportations of people living in the U.S. illegally also increased under the Obama administration, though Republicans criticized Obama for setting prosecution guidelines that spared some groups from the threat of deportation, including those brought to the U.S. illegally as children.

Last week, ICE officers arrested more than 680 people around the country in what Kelly said were routine, targeted operations; advocates called the actions stepped-up enforcement under Trump.

___

The AP National Investigative Team can be reached at investigate@ap.org

(AP) – The Trump administration is considering a proposal to mobilize as many as 100,000 National Guard troops to round up unauthorized immigrants, including millions living nowhere near the Mexico border, according to a draft memo obtained by The Associated Press.

The 11-page document calls for the unprecedented militarization of immigration enforcement as far north as Portland, Oregon, and as far east as New Orleans, Louisiana.

Four states that border on Mexico are included in the proposal — California, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas — but it also encompasses seven states contiguous to those four — Oregon, Nevada, Utah, Colorado, Oklahoma, Arkansas and Louisiana.

White House spokesman Sean Spicer said the AP report was “100 percent not sure” and “irresponsible.” “There is no effort at all to utilize the National Guard to round up unauthorized immigrants,” he said.

Governors in the 11 states would have a choice whether to have their guard troops participate, according to the memo, written by U.S. Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly, a retired four-star Marine general.

While National Guard personnel have been used to assist with immigration-related missions on the U.S.-Mexico border before, they have never been used as broadly or as far north.

The memo is addressed to the then-acting heads of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and U.S. Customs and Border Protection. It would serve as guidance to implement the wide-ranging executive order on immigration and border security that President Donald Trump signed Jan. 25. Such memos are routinely issued to supplement executive orders.

Also dated Jan. 25, the draft memo says participating troops would be authorized “to perform the functions of an immigration officer in relation to the investigation, apprehension and detention of aliens in the United States.” It describes how the troops would be activated under a revived state-federal partnership program, and states that personnel would be authorized to conduct searches and identify and arrest any unauthorized immigrants.

Requests to the White House and the Department of Homeland Security for comment and a status report on the proposal were not answered.

Related Stories

The draft document has circulated among DHS staff over the last two weeks. As recently as Friday, staffers in several different offices reported discussions were underway.

If implemented, the impact could be significant. Nearly one-half of the 11.1 million people residing in the U.S. without authorization live in the 11 states, according to Pew Research Center estimates based on 2014 Census data.

Use of National Guard troops would greatly increase the number of immigrants targeted in one of Trump’s executive orders last month, which expanded the definition of who could be considered a criminal and therefore a potential target for deportation. That order also allows immigration agents to prioritize removing anyone who has “committed acts that constitute a chargeable criminal offense.”

Under current rules, even if the proposal is implemented, there would not be immediate mass deportations. Those with existing deportation orders could be sent back to their countries of origin without additional court proceedings. But deportation orders generally would be needed for most other unauthorized immigrants.

The troops would not be nationalized, remaining under state control.

Spokespeople for the governors of Arizona, Utah, Nevada, California, Colorado, Oklahoma, Oregon and New Mexico said they were unaware of the proposal, and either declined to comment or said it was premature to discuss whether they would participate. The other three states did not immediately respond to the AP.

The proposal would extend the federal-local partnership program that President Barack Obama’s administration began scaling back in 2012 to address complaints that it promoted racial profiling.

The 287(g) program, which Trump included in his immigration executive order, gives local police, sheriff’s deputies and state troopers the authority to assist in the detection of immigrants who are in the U.S. illegally as a regular part of their law enforcement duties on the streets and in jails.

The draft memo also mentions other items included in Trump’s executive order, including the hiring of an additional 5,000 border agents, which needs financing from Congress, and his campaign promise to build a wall between the U.S. and Mexico.

The signed order contained no mention of the possible use of state National Guard troops.

According to the draft memo, the militarization effort would be proactive, specifically empowering Guard troops to solely carry out immigration enforcement, not as an add-on the way local law enforcement is used in the program.

In addition to responding to natural or man-made disasters or for military protection of the population or critical infrastructure, state Guard forces have been used to assist with immigration-related tasks on the U.S.-Mexico border, including the construction of fences.

In the mid-2000s, President George W. Bush twice deployed Guard troops on the border to focus on non-law enforcement duties to help augment the Border Patrol as it bolstered its ranks. And in 2010, then-Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer announced a border security plan that included Guard reconnaissance, aerial patrolling and military exercises.

In July 2014, then-Texas Gov. Rick Perry ordered 1,000 National Guard troops to the border when the surge of migrant children fleeing violence in Central America overwhelmed U.S. officials responsible for their care. The Guard troops’ stated role on the border at the time was to provide extra sets of eyes but not make arrests.

Bush initiated the federal 287(g) program — named for a section of a 1996 immigration law — to allow specially trained local law enforcement officials to participate in immigration enforcement on the streets and check whether people held in local jails were in the country illegally. ICE trained and certified roughly 1,600 officers to carry out those checks from 2006 to 2015.

The memo describes the program as a “highly successful force multiplier” that identified more than 402,000 “removable aliens.”

But federal watchdogs were critical of how DHS ran the program, saying it was poorly supervised and provided insufficient training to officers, including on civil rights law. Obama phased out all the arrest power agreements in 2013 to instead focus on deporting recent border crossers and immigrants in the country illegally who posed a safety or national security threat.

Trump’s immigration strategy emerges as detentions at the nation’s southern border are down significantly from levels seen in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Last year, the arrest tally was the fifth-lowest since 1972. Deportations of people living in the U.S. illegally also increased under the Obama administration, though Republicans criticized Obama for setting prosecution guidelines that spared some groups from the threat of deportation, including those brought to the U.S. illegally as children.

Last week, ICE officers arrested more than 680 people around the country in what Kelly said were routine, targeted operations; advocates called the actions stepped-up enforcement under Trump.

NEW YORK CITY, New York — The Old Dominion is back on the chessboard as the final week of the campaign begins with a new poll from Boston’s Emerson College showing Democrat Hillary Rodham Clinton’s lead there has nearly evaporated.

Clinton is only ahead of her Republican opponent Donald J. Trump by four percentage points—just outside the 3.4 percent margin of error—in Virginia. This is the state’s first survey taken since FBI director James Comey announced he was reopening the criminal investigation into Clinton’s illicit home-brew email server that she set up in violation of State Department guidelines.

The poll of 800 likely voters found Clinton at 49 percent compared to Trump’s 45 percent. Libertarian Gary Johnson pulled three percent and the Green Party’s Jill Stein pulled one percent. The survey was conducted from Friday Oct. 28 through Sunday Oct. 30.

The fact that things are this close in Virginia is shocking to many political observers in the home stretch here, as it was widely presumed that Clinton had wrapped up the state a long time ago with the selection of Virginia Sen. Tim Kaine as her running mate. But now it seems that the Democrats’ grip on Virginia is slipping, and its 13 electoral votes hang in the balance. Without those electoral votes, Hillary Clinton’s pathway to the White House becomes essentially non-existent.

With Trump putting traditionally blue states like Michigan, New Mexico, Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Pennsylvania—along with Maine’s second congressional district—in play, that makes Virginia must-win for Clinton. She can’t afford to lose it, but Trump can—as without Virginia, Trump has a number of different pathways to the White House while Clinton does not have a path without it.

In the final week plus of the race, the map has significantly expanded for Trump as the billionaire businessman has become competitive in many of these places. It’s unclear which, if any, he may break out in for a win, but the fact he’s surging everywhere across the board has got to have the Clinton campaign worried. But Trump has been campaigning in New Mexico, Pennsylvania and Michigan over the past couple days.

Hillary Clinton’s campaign had once hoped the California primary could be a coronation for the former secretary of State, the last major stop en route to claiming the Democratic presidential nomination.

Instead, it has turned into a dogfight with Bernie Sanders, who has been campaigning nonstop through the state. With at least one public poll showing the race now a tie, the Clinton campaign has decided to step up her appearances in the state.

“It’s going to be closer than we thought,” said former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, a longtime Clinton backer, adding that he ultimately expected her to win the state.

“Hillary’s going to be the nominee, but California’s the big prize, and obviously she’d like to go into the convention with a win in California,” he said.

Clinton does not need to win California to clinch the nomination. She now has 2,310 delegates to this summer’s nominating convention, according to the latest count, and needs only 73 more for a majority. She is expected to win a significant majority of Puerto Rico’s 67 delegates in its primary on Sunday.

By the time California and five other states vote on June 7, Clinton will need only a few of the 694 pledged delegates up for grabs that day.

Hillary and Bill Clinton attend a Memorial Day ceremony in Chappaqua on May 30, 2016.(Photo: Eric Thayer, Getty Images)

Despite all that, a loss in this enormous, diverse, overwhelmingly Democratic state would be an ugly stain in the lead-up to the party’s convention in July in Philadelphia.

“She’s going to be able to give an important victory speech on Tuesday as the presumptive nominee, and it’s clearly more appealing to do that when the chyron at the bottom of the [television] screen is reading that Clinton is the projected winner of California,” said Dan Newman, a veteran Democratic operative whose San Francisco-based firm is aiding Clinton’s campaign in the state.

“California is important because it’s California. It’s big, it’s overwhelmingly Democratic, and she’s the nominee regardless, but it would send her into the general election with an extra head of steam to win California. It’s certainly not do or die, but it’s always preferable to win everywhere.”

And Clinton, despite her significant lead over Sanders in the popular vote and in the delegate tally, has not won everywhere. The Vermont senator has racked up 20 wins, compared with her 26, and he has taken three of the last five contests.

Clinton was widely expected to win California this year by about 8 percentage points, the same margin by which she beat then-Sen. Barack Obama in the 2008 primary. She and her husband, former President Bill Clinton, have forged strong ties to the state’s Democrats during their decades in public life.

“California has been uncommonly good to my family,” Bill Clinton told more than 1,000 people in a courtyard at Los Angeles Trade-Technical College in April when he campaigned for his wife here.

The state, where the couple first lived together as boyfriend and girlfriend in the early 1970s, has provided support, solace and tens of millions of dollars in campaign cash for the family’s pursuits.

Hillary Clinton, who had little to smile about as she marched in her hometown’s Memorial Day parade, is so desperate to stave off a humiliating loss to Bernie Sanders in California that she is ditching a planned stop in New Jersey to stretch out her Golden State trip this week.

Clinton leads Sanders in California, but only by a measly 2 points, 46 percent to 44 percent, the Public Policy Institute of California found Thursday in the race’s most recent poll.

Although her delegate lead is all but insurmountable, a loss in the nation’s most populous state could slow Clinton’s momentum, following a State Department report that slammed her use of a private ­email server as secretary of state.

Meanwhile, Sanders has ramped up his campaign in the Golden State ahead of its primary next Tuesday, hoping to pull off an upset victory that would theoretically keep his campaign alive.

With 475 delegates at stake in California, Sanders has said he aims to secure as many as possible to make the case at July’s Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia that he would be the stronger general-election candidate.

A victory in California would also help Sanders argue that his far-left platform appeals to a diverse bloc of voters.

Clinton’s campaign announced Monday that an “organizing event” planned for Thursday at Mercer County Community College in West Windsor, NJ, was canceled due to a “scheduling” change.

She will still appear at a fundraiser with Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ) in New Jersey and another with former Attorney General Eric Holder in Manhattan on Tuesday, followed by a rally at Rutgers University in Newark on Wednesday.

Details of her California appearances were not immediately released, but it was expected that Clinton would crisscross the state for five straight days to try to seal the deal with voters.

In her only public appearance Monday, Clinton marched in a Memorial Day parade in Chappaqua, Westchester County, with husband Bill Clinton and Gov. Andrew Cuomo.

The crowd cheered, and many waved Clinton campaign signs.

The Clintons have marched in the parade before, and resident Kelly Aidekman said she viewed them “as if they were any other neighbors” in the affluent suburb.

One local wasn’t so neighborly.

Hillary Clinton waves to the crowd at a Memorial Day parade alongside Gov. Andrew Cuomo in Chappaqua, New York.

John Nadler held a sign supporting Donald Trump, saying he wanted “to let people know that there’s more than one choice.”

Sanders, meanwhile, campaigned Monday in Oakland, Calif., stopping at Allen Temple, a historic black church. He was joined by actor Danny Glover.

At one point, four people rushed the stage and were taken into custody by the Secret Service before they could reach Sanders. It is not clear what they wanted.

Sanders, who has criticized Clinton’s support for the Iraq war, also took to Twitter to push his pacifist politics on Memorial Day.

“We must never take lightly the decision to send our sons and daughters to battle, and it must always be the last resort,” read one tweet.

“We must go beyond fine speeches if we’re serious about protecting the needs of veterans. They’ve protected us. Now we must protect them,” another read.

And he slammed Clinton for what he called her lack of support for financially devastated Puerto Rico.

“As has happened many times before, Secretary Clinton has changed her mind and is inching closer to positions I have taken,” he said. “But what she says only days before Election Day in Puerto Rico is too little, too late.”

Clinton supported a House bill establishing a control board that would have the power to impose austerity measures to ease Puerto Rico’s $70 billion debt. She has softened her position as the island’s June 5 primary approaches.

North and South Dakota, Montana, New Mexico and New Jersey will also hold primaries June 7.

First Read is a morning briefing from Meet the Press and the NBC Political Unit on the day’s most important political stories and why they matter.

Why Hillary Clinton needs to win California next week

Yes, Hillary Clinton is just 72 delegates away from crossing the 2,383 magic number needed for a majority of delegates to win the Democratic convention. Yes, she’s likely to hit that milestone before polls even close in California (due to the New Jersey primary and its 126 pledged delegates). And, yes, even if she loses in California by 10 points, her lead over Bernie Sanders in pledged delegates would still be twice the size of Obama’s lead over Clinton in 2008. But here’s the reason why Clinton needs to beat Sanders in California next week: She doesn’t want to give him any legitimate rationale to remain in the race beyond June 7 or June 14 (the final primary in DC).

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Why? Because as our colleague Dante Chinni writes, the moment Sanders exits the race, her poll numbers against Trump will increase. “[T]o get a better look at where the Clinton-Trump race might stand after the nominating dust has settled, we recalculated the latest NBC/WSJ poll with Clinton capturing 70 percent of the Sanders-only vote.

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The result: those Sanders-only voters are worth an extra five points to Clinton. In the NBC/WSJ poll, Clinton’s advantage over Trump goes from three points to eight points and she leads 51 percent to 43 percent.” Maybe that’s why Clinton has canceled an event in New Jersey this week to spend more time in California, as NBC’s Kristen Welker reported on “Today” this morning.

Even as Sanders continues to move the goal posts

Then again, one thing that Sanders has successfully done over the past month is move the goal posts while trailing Clinton by 270 pledged delegates and more than 700 overall delegates. Here was Sanders before New York’s primary, which he lost by 16 points: “We will win a major victory here in New York next Tuesday.”

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And here he was before the Pennsylvania primary, which he lost by 12 points: “You know what? I think we’re going to win here in Pennsylvania next week.” And here was Sanders on “Meet the Press” last Sunday: “I think we have a good chance to win in California, maybe win big, and maybe win four or five of the other states that are off on June 7th… California is the big enchilada, so to speak.”

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Given these past statements, even if Sanders loses in California, it’s possible to see him continue his campaign. But a loss in the Golden State would leave him without any legitimate rationale to flip superdelegates, especially when he trails in pledged delegates and the popular vote. And Sanders even acknowledged that reality on “Meet”: “Obviously, if we don’t do well in California, it will make our path much, much harder. No question about it,” he said. The current Democratic delegate math:

In pledged delegates, Clinton currently holds a lead of 270 delegates

Clinton 1,770 (54%)

Sanders 1,500 (46%)

Clinton must win 33% of remaining pledged delegates to get a majority in pledged delegates

Sanders must win 67% of remaining pledged delegates to get a majority in pledged delegates

Clinton must win 8% of remaining delegates to reach 2,383 magic number

Sanders must win 92% of remaining delegates to reach 2,383 magic number

Do Trump’s fundraising numbers for veterans add up?

As NBC’s Hallie Jackson reported on “Today” this morning, Donald Trump will hold a news conference at 11:00 am ET to respond to criticism that his January 28 fundraiser for veterans didn’t raise as much money as claimed. The Washington Post with more: “Last week — after intense pressure from the news media — Donald Trump made good on a promise he had made in January. He gave $1 million of his own money to a charity for veterans… On Tuesday morning, the day after Memorial Day, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee has scheduled a news conference at Trump Tower in New York. He is expected to announce that he had made good on a separate promise to veterans, made at the same time as the $1 million pledge… In January, on the night of the fundraiser, Trump was (seemingly) clear about the night’s total haul. “We just cracked $6 million, right? Six million.” But that figure appears to be false. Earlier this month, Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski said the fundraiser had actually netted $4.5 million, because some big donors had not paid up. Then, a few days later, Trump said Lewandowski’s figures were wrong. In fact, Trump said, the total fundraising haul was $5.5 million, after he had made good on his own pledge to give $1 million from his pocket.” The Clinton campaign will hold a conference call at 1:00 pm ET “to call out Donald Trump’s hypocrisy by fraudulently touting his support for veterans when his actual record has been one of disrespect,” per a press release.

For all of the media attention on whether a prominent Republican will mount a third-party challenge to Trump, here’s the reality: We already have a third-party challenge: former New Mexico Gov. Gary Johnson. And unlike a Mitt Romney/Ben Sasse/Paul Ryan running – which is UNLIKELY to happen – Johnson will have ballot access. MSNBC’s Jane Timm: “The Libertarian Party nominated former New Mexico Gov. Gary Johnson and former Massachusetts Gov. William Weld as its presidential ticket Sunday, as the party attempts to elevate itself into the mainstream during an election that’s given the small party unprecedented opportunity.”

Donald Trump holds his press conference in New York at 11:00 am ET… And Bernie Sanders campaigns in California, hitting Emeryville, Santa Cruz, and Monterey. Don’t forget to check out the political unit’s rolling minute-to-minute coverage of all the latest 2016 developments at the On the Trail liveblog at NBCNews.com.

The article is is consistent with a not-so-subtle campaign by Clinton surrogates to discredit Sen. Sanders in order to limit his influence in moving the Democratic Party away from Clintonian corporate-friendly triangulation and back to its FDR-style New Deal roots as a party representing the interests of the working and middle classes; to discourage voters from going to the polls for Bernie in California and the other remaining primaries; and to excuse the manifest weakness of Secretary Clinton as a Presidential candidate by blaming it on Bernie.

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Let’s be clear. There’s only the most remote chance of Bernie winning the 2016 Democratic Presidential nomination. And when the primaries are over, there will need to be a united front between Bernie and Hillary and their respective supporters to defeat the racist, xenophobic, misogynist Donald Trump.

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But by every possible metric other than actually winning the nomination, Sanders’ candidacy has been an astounding success that will change America and the world for the better in ways we can only begin to imagine.

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Let us count the ways:

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• Hillary will likely eke out a win in the battle for the Democratic nomination, but Bernie has won the battle for the soul of the Democratic Party and the wider progressive movement.

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• Bernie (and fellow progressives like Elizabeth Warren) represent the future of the Democratic Party while Hillary and Clintonism represent the past. Bernie has won overwhelming majorities among people under 45-years old (as well as independents). These are the people who will dominate the Democratic Party and the progressive movement in years to come.

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• Bernie has raised voters’ enthusiasm level. Despite limited media coverage, he regularly gets tens of thousands of enthusiastic supporters to his rallies, while Hillary struggles to get a few hundred or a few thousand. Democrats will need the enthusiasm of Bernie’s supporters to defeat Trump.

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• Bernie’s campaign has become the largest progressive movement in recent history. As I’ve previously written, it will hopefully transform itself into a permanent mass progressive socialist/social democratic/progressive organization that will both run progressive candidates at every level of government from dog-catcher, to City-Councils, the State Legislatures to Congress, and organize popular campaigns, sometimes including large-scale demonstrations and even non-violent civil disobedience, for progressive change.

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• Bernie has placed the issue of America’s corrupt campaign finance system front and center on the political agenda. And he’s done it not only with words but with deeds, raising over $200 million from over 8 million individual contributions averaging $27, while Hillary has relied on larger contributions and several Super PACs. Until millionaires, billionaires and corporations are no longer allowed to buy our elections, it’s unlikely that we will solve any of the nation’s serious problems. Bernie is leading the way.

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• Bernie has made “democratic socialism” a word that can now be spoken in polite company. 42% of Iowa Democratic caucus-goers identified themselves as socialists. A year ago, I doubt if the number would have been 4%. Increasingly, younger people reject unfettered, unregulated neoliberal forms of capitalism and are looking for an alternative. Bernie has started to provide one.

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• Bernie has set the political agenda for the Democratic Party and the progressive movement while Hillary has followed meekly behind. He has made the issue of economic inequality one of the pressing issues of our times.

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Raising the minimum wage to $15; guaranteeing healthcare to all Americans; making it possible for every student who wants it to get a free college education at a public institution; increasing social security benefits by lifting the cap on social security taxes for wealthy taxpayers; creating well-paying jobs by investing in our crumbling infrastructure; taxing Wall Street transactions; breaking up the biggest banks who tanked the economy and threw millions out of work; opposing corporate-friendly trades deals that send American jobs overseas:

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These are the winning issues for Democrats. Hillary and the Democratic Party would be wise to appropriate much of Bernie’s programs if they want to defeat Trump and win over voters who’ve been left out of the neoliberal global economy.

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• Bernie has emphasized that climate change is the existential issue of our times. He opposes fracking. And he wants to put a tax on carbon. Adequately addressing climate change could literally determine the future of the human race on this planet.

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Peter Rosenstein’s Huffington Post article scornfully concludes, “Bernie you LOST…While you have achieved your fifteen minutes of fame and made a real difference in the discussion if you want to actually make a difference on the issues you care about you will gracefully leave the stage [sic].”

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If the Democratic Party and the Clinton campaign adopt Rosenstein’s arrogant and demeaning attitude towards Bernie and his supporters, they will make it likely that fewer of Bernie’s supporters will turn out to pull the lever for Hillary and defeat Trump.

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There are still 9 Democratic primaries and caucuses remaining with 930 delegates at stake, including the Big Kahuna, California, with 546 delegates. While it’s improbable that Bernie will win the remaining contests by a large enough margin to gain a majority of the pledged delegates, there is no reason for Bernie to “leave the stage” and deprive voters in those 9 states of the opportunity to voice their views.

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Moreover, Bernie will likely come into the Democratic Convention with 45%-47% of the pledged delegates. Yes, Bernie should support Hillary to defeat Trump and urge his supporters to do the same. He’s already said that he’ll do everything in his power to prevent Trump from becoming President.

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But an anti-Trump united front between Hillary supporters and Bernie supporters is a two-way street. To be effective, it will require the Clinton campaign and the Democratic Party to incorporate many of Bernie’s principles and ideas.

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That includes making the Democratic Party more democratic by eliminating unelected Superdelegates and opening as many Democratic primaries as possible to independents in the future. 44% of the electorate identifies as independent and Democrats need their participation and support to win.

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It also includes incorporating many of Bernie’s themes and policy proposals, not only into a Democratic Platform that no one reads, but into Hillary’s actual campaign. Thematically, that means making an end to the corrupt campaign finance system and an economy rigged in favor of the billionaires and corporations against the working and middle classes the core of the Democratic Party. Programmatically, it means going beyond many of Hillary’s timid proposals to incorporate such things as a $15 minimum wage, free college tuition, increased social security benefits, and a tax on carbon.

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Bernie has had way more than “15 minutes of fame”. He has inspired millions to work to change the world for the better. He has fundamentally changed the political dialogue and set the future agenda for the Democratic Party, the progressive movement, and America as a whole.

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Hillary and the Democratic Party would be wise to welcome much of Bernie’s values and agenda into their campaign. To paraphrase Rosenstein, “Any other scenario places you in the position to take the blame if Trump wins.”

Donald Trump was in New Mexico yesterday enjoying himself and creating the sort of havoc that generally only does him good. Anti-Trump protestors smashed a door and threw rocks while attacking his rally at Albuquerque’s convention center. The violence, along with the fact that some of the protesters reportedly waved Mexican flags, created the same sense of America under siege that feeds the anxiety of Trump supporters as well as makes the candidate’s case about the need for tougher immigration policies. Far from hurting him, such scenes help him enormously. Meanwhile, Trump was giving the sort of trademark speech that delights his followers and infuriates foes, in which he mocked Hillary Clinton’s speaking style and called Senator Elizabeth Warren (who has become one of the Democrats’ leading anti-Trump surrogates lately) “Pocahontas.”

It was all typical Trump bluster and anyone who thinks his no-holds-barred style doesn’t help more than it hurts his cause hasn’t been paying attention to events in the last several months. But there was one particular target of his ire that is worthy of special attention: New Mexico Governor Susana Martinez. The governor is one of the holdouts among Republican officeholders who have not yet endorsed their party’s presumptive presidential nominee. But while Trump has toned down his act recently in an attempt to woo some other leading GOP members of the House and Senate that have opposed him just as much as the governor — in particular, House Speaker Paul Ryan — he isn’t playing nice with Martinez. He used his speech to attack her for “not doing the job.” Up until now, Trump’s scorched earth tactics have worked against all his Republican opponents. But now that the nomination is locked up, his decision to try to bully rather than woo Martinez raises questions that speak to his weaknesses heading into the general election, as well as to the future of a GOP that may, win or lose in November, be dominated by Trump.

Trump’s attack on Martinez was a typical Donald misdirection play. Though he tells Republicans he’s a conservative, he often attacks opponents from the left and that’s what happened here. By accusing her of being responsible for the state’s economic problems and an increase in food stamps, he was reading from the Democratic playbook. New Mexico liberals have been frustrated by the two-term governor’s popularity as well as her insistence on governing like a conservative. So for Trump to use these sorts of talking points — as well as blaming her for federal decisions to settle some Syrian refugees in her state — against the chair of the Republican Governors Association and a person who has kept the GOP alive in a state that is increasingly trending blue is an interesting choice.

Of course, since he’s already won the nomination, he didn’t have to attack Martinez at all. But rather than sending an olive branch to the governor or just ignoring her, he gave Martinez the same treatment he previously dished out to competitors like Jeb Bush, Marco Rubio or Ted Cruz.

Why did he do it? As we’ve seen in the last several weeks after it became clear that he would be the nominee, Trump has no plans to undergo a personality transplant. Acting presidential is too boring for him, not to mention the fact that his boorish behavior has helped rather than hurt his cause. But creating the party unity that is necessary if he’s going to have a chance of winning the general election requires a degree of diplomacy. Trump is smart enough to know that in order to get unity he can’t bully everyone, and that seems to be his strategy with Ryan. But with Martinez, a Hispanic, and one of the GOP’s most prominent women, he doesn’t seem to think he needs to behave the same way.

The message here is unmistakable and one that seems to be a not-so-subtle signal to his core supporters as well as to opponents. This isn’t so much a dog whistle as it is a neon sign flashing a message that tells both Hispanics and women that the Trump train is more interested in running them over than in getting them to hop on board. Trump’s apologists can talk until they are blue in the face on cable news networks about what a great guy he is and how well he treats Hispanics and women in his employ. But it appears that, when it comes to getting a Republican who is a Hispanic woman to endorse him, he has reverted to his trademark bullying rather than diplomacy.

In Martinez’s case, it’s unlikely to work. An endorsement of Trump in a state where the Hispanic vote is so important isn’t going to help her win a third term in 2018. Perhaps that’s why Trump isn’t bothering even to try to make peace with her. But like a lot of what has worked for Trump in this election cycle, it leads to questions about the impact his tactics might have on the future of the Republican Party.

Trump’s key to victory this year clearly lies in rallying a record number of white males to the polls that haven’t voted before. Whether the millions of angry and fearful white males he needs to materialize in November actually exist or are merely a figment of the imagination of conservatives who wrongly blamed President Obama’s 2012 re-election on the lack of conservative enthusiasm for Mitt Romney has yet to be proven. But the idea that Republicans can write off both the growing Hispanic vote as well as women is a curious formula for electoral success.

Martinez was given a prime speaking spot at the 2012 Republican convention because it was understood she was a model of how they could expand the reach of the party. But in Donald Trump’s GOP, she has become a heretic who must be destroyed.

Given the current polls, one can’t dismiss the possibility that Trump can win even without Hispanic support or while losing the female vote by the sort of margin that would have heretofore be considered a guarantee of defeat. But a Republican Party where a Susana Martinez becomes a persona non-grata is not one that can win elections in the long run. By attacking her in this manner, Trump may get cheers from his core supporters but he is also ensuring a bleak future for the party that he and his backers have hijacked.

Charles Krauthammer said on the Fox News Channels “Special Report” on May 25, 2016, “Trump wanted revenge because New Mexico Governor Susana Martinez didn’t endorse him and skipped his rally. And he exacted it.”

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M.— Donald Trump’s criticism of the nation’s first Latina governor threatens to further damage his image in the Hispanic community as he turns toward a general election where those voters will be pivotal.

At a rally in Albuquerque on Tuesday night, the presumptive GOP presidential nominee pointed to a rise in food stamp recipients under New Mexico Gov. Susana Martinez, who heads the Republican Governors Association. “She’s gotta do a better job,” he said.

On Wednesday in Southern California, Mr. Trump invoked the name of a San Francisco woman killed last year by an illegal immigrant. “Build that wall! Build that wall! Build that wall!’’ the crowd chanted.

Mr. Trump’s appearances in two of the three states with the largest Hispanic electorates follow a few initial overtures to Hispanic voters in recent weeks that have drawn mixed results. The Pew Hispanic Center estimates a record 27.3 million Latinos will be eligible to vote in 2016 and would make up about 12% of the electorate, up from 10% in 2012.

Mr. Trump’s campaign didn’t respond to questions about whether he planned to hire campaign staffers focused on Hispanic outreach to improve his large deficit with that group in polls.
“I’ve never liked the pandering game, but I’ve never seen someone do it so antagonistically,” said Republican state Rep. Rod Montoya of Farmington, who plans to vote in New Mexico’s June 7 primary for Texas Sen. Ted Cruz even though he has dropped out of the race. Mr. Trump, he added, “is not helping his cause.”

At both rallies this week, Mr. Trump said his appeal is growing as Hispanic voters learn about plans to create jobs and prosperity. “We’re going to win with Hispanics,” Mr. Trump told the ethnically diverse crowd of thousands at the Albuquerque Convention Center. “They don’t want their homes taken away and they don’t want their jobs taken away.”

But some Hispanic leaders say Mr. Trump first must apologize for branding Mexican immigrants as criminals in his campaign announcement and making other inflammatory remarks before they would be open to hearing his campaign agenda.

Mrs. Martinez didn’t attend the rally. Her spokesman, Mike Lonergan, said Wednesday “the governor will not be bullied” into backing him. The governor “cares about what [Mr. Trump] says he will do to help New Mexicans. She’s disappointed that she didn’t hear anything about that last night,” he said in a statement.

On the Mexican holiday of Cinco de Mayo earlier this month, Mr. Trump posted on Twitter a picture of him eating a taco bowl and wrote, “I love Hispanics.” This past weekend, he sent a video to a gathering of the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference in which he said, “National…Hispanic…Christian…. three great words!”

These gestures “did not help, whatsoever,” said the Rev. Samuel Rodriguez, president of the nation’s largest Hispanic Christian group, which is nonpartisan. “If Donald Trump wants to redeem himself with Hispanic voters, he has to engage in a mea culpa for the demagoguery and hyperbole.”

Darrell Scott, a Cleveland pastor serving as chief executive officer of the National Diversity Coalition for Trump, a multiethnic and multiracial group, defended Mr. Trump’s unscripted approach in the video. “He’s not pandering. It’s genuine,” he said. “He is authentic, and that’s what resonates with the American people.’’

Mr. Trump has flagged illegal immigration as a pressing problem and said he would deport millions of undocumented workers and force Mexico to pay for a wall along the border.

“He’s not anti-immigrant. He’s anti-illegal immigrant,” said Dahlys Hamilton, who started an Atlanta-based group called Hispanic Patriots for Trump. “People don’t know that because they are too busy spinning rhetoric that he’s a racist.”

She also belongs to the National Diversity Coalition for Trump, which is organizing gatherings for the presumptive GOP nominee. The group doesn’t include any of the major Hispanic surrogates for Republican nominees Mitt Romney and John McCain or former President George W. Bush.

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“ Hillary Clinton is a seasoned politician, and it will probably be a good idea for Trump to look to who would be respected in the Hispanic community to lean on,” said Debe Campos-Fleenor, a Mexican-American insurance agent in Tucson, Ariz., who belongs to the pro-Trump coalition.

Mrs. Clinton has about a half dozen staff members devoted to Hispanic outreach and media and is backed by a grass-roots group called Latinos for Hillary that launched in October. She also has a team of high-profile Hispanic surrogates, including members of Congress and cabinet secretaries, who are regularly booked on Spanish-language media.

Mrs. Clinton’s efforts to make inroads with Hispanic voters began months ago. She has stumped on behalf of President Barack Obama’s executive orders protecting some illegal immigrants from deportation. The campaign has organized “Latina-to-Latina” phone banks, “Mujeres in Politics” meetings for women, Hispanic debate watch parties and other events in Texas, Arizona, Colorado and Florida.

State Rep. Alonzo Baldonado, who represents a district south of Albuquerque, said he would support Mr. Trump “because I’m a Republican and I am going to support the nominee.” He added that he agrees with Mr. Trump’s emphasis on national security.

“I have Hispanic constituents who are solid Donald Trump supporters, and I have those who are telling me they could never support him,” he added. “I’ve also had people tell me not to endorse Trump because I will lose support for my own campaign.”

So far, Hispanic voters have a very negative view of Mr. Trump, a Wall Street Journal/NBC News survey conducted this month shows. Some 68% would back Mrs. Clinton and 20% would back Mr. Trump if the two faced off in the general election, the survey found. Mrs. Clinton’s 48-point advantage among Hispanics is far larger than her 3-point lead among voters overall in the survey.

The share of Hispanic voters who see Mr. Trump in a negative light outweighs those with a positive view by 52 percentage points, the poll found. At this point in 2012, Hispanic views of GOP nominee Mitt Romney were more negative than positive by 9 points.

At the same time, Mrs. Clinton is also viewed less favorably by Hispanic voters than was her party’s last nominee. The share of Hispanic voters who see her in a positive light is 7 points higher than the share with a negative view. By contrast, Mr. Obama was 35 points more positive than negative among Hispanic voters at this point in 2012.

The dueling videos recently sent by Mr. Trump and Mrs. Clinton to the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference reflect the tenor and breadth of their overall Hispanic outreach: his approach appears unorganized while hers resembles a professional marketing campaign.

In his video, Mr. Trump is sitting on his plane and reads the name of the organization off a sheet of paper. “It’s not going to be easy but I’m going to win and we’re going to take care of everybody,” says Mr. Trump, who promises to reduce unemployment and crime and improve urban schools and border security.

Mrs. Clinton, by contrast, rattles off the name of the group, the title of its annual gathering and its leadership. She quotes from Scripture.

She also takes on Mr. Trump without directly mentioning his name.

“You know we’re hearing some divisive and dangerous rhetoric in this election,” she says. “We have a candidate who wants to tear families apart and forcibly deport 11 million undocumented immigrants.”

Protests outside a Donald Trump rally in Albuquerque turned violent last night as demonstrators trying to disrupt his speech clashed with riot police, set fires and sent people running in fear over the sound of a ‘gunshot’.

Around 100 protesters broke through a barricade outside the building shortly after Trump took to the stage, trying to throw rocks through a window and at police, and setting fires on the street outside.

One officer told reporters that a shot was fired from a pellet gun, and a second officer said it was a bullet – though subsequent reports have cast doubts over the ‘gunfire’.

Smoke canisters erupted through the streets as police tried to surround the protesters, while multiple officers are being treated for injuries and one protester has been arrested, police told Daily Mail Online.

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About 100 protesters broke through a barricade outside the building shortly after Trump took to the stage, and tried to throw rocks through a window. Others set fires on the street and threw rocks at police (pictured)

Anyone doubting the influence of the loosely-knit band of demagogues known as Black Lives Matter probably wasn’t at the White House last Thursday, where President Obama met with black leaders to discuss race, crime and policing. Among the attendees were Al Sharpton, National Urban League President Marc Morial, Rep. John Lewis, D-Ga., and Black Lives Matter activists DeRay McKesson and Brittany Packnett (in photo). Obama invited McKesson and Packnett as a gesture to young blacks. Their inclusion underscores the summit’s unspoken assumption: White lives don’t matter.

National Legal and Policy Center early in January described the origins and motives of Black Lives Matter (BLM). The group was launched in July 2013 by three black female community activists in the immediate wake of a wholly justified decision by a Florida trial jury not to convict a white neighborhood crime patrol volunteer, George Zimmerman, for murder in the self-defense shooting death of a black teenaged attacker, Trayvon Martin. In short order, Black Lives Matter has rewritten the rules of racial agitprop. Having learned the lessons of the maestros, Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson, the organization, now with nearly 30 chapters nationwide, has applied those lessons at hundreds of inflammatory protests in cities and on college campuses. The intent is to punish acts of “white racism.”

Black Lives Matter has no official headquarters, no building to call its own. The decentralized group frames its appeal mainly to young blacks, who though easily manipulated, are adept at navigating social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter. BLM played a central role in organizing and escalating street protests in the St. Louis suburb of Ferguson, Missouri in the aftermath of the August 2014 fatal shooting of a local 18-year-old, Michael Brown, at the hands of a white police officer, Darren Wilson. Evidence overwhelmingly showed that Brown, far from being an “unarmed” gentle giant shot from behind while attempting to surrender, had tried to murder Officer Wilson. That’s why a grand jury did not indict Wilson. Having heard extensive testimony and reviewed countless documents and photos for three months, members realized there was nothing to prosecute. Al Sharpton, having visited St. Louis to rouse the rabble, saw his “peacemaking” efforts go for naught. Certain protestors did more than simply make their views known. They also rioted. At one rally in March 2015, just as things were about to break up, a protestor, supposedly “not with the group,” shot and wounded two cops.

In a real sense, Black Lives Matter can be seen as “Sharpton 2.0.” Its weapon of choice is the smart phone. And its members are gearing up for battle. They are convinced that blacks in America are facing extermination. This is paranoid nonsense, but it isn’t that different from statements made by Sharpton and his peers over the decades. As evidence, BLM activists regularly cite the recent deaths of young blacks such as Trayvon Martin, Michael Brown, Tamir Rice, Oscar Grant and Freddie Gray during police apprehensions. Yet in each of these cases, an assertion of murder at the hands of a white collapsed under the weight of fabrications and/or omissions. Unable or willing to apply cause-and-effect reasoning, Black Lives Matter members insist upon the arrest and conviction of white police officers on the flimsiest of pretexts. These activists cannot accept facts that contradict their overarching narrative of “white oppressor, black victim.” Their application of the “beyond a reasonable doubt” standard in a criminal case apparently only applies when the defendant is black; if the defendant is white, all bets are off. Racial loyalty, not evidence, is what matters. Black Lives Matter leaders claim they are trying to defuse police-community tensions. In reality, they are lighting matches to a powder keg.

If the tactics of Black Lives Matter seem more menacing than those employed by established black activists, the views of each are quite similar. It therefore makes sense that just as mainstream black protestors have won friends in high places, so has BLM. Some of these friends are generous. This February 5, hip-hop recording artist/entrepreneur Jay Z announced that he would donate $1.5 million from the proceeds of an October concert sponsored by his music streaming service, Tidal, to more than a dozen “social justice” organizations, Black Lives Matter among them. That’s small change compared to the $33 million that multibillionaire financier George Soros, through his Open Society Foundations, gave during a recent 12-month period to various radical groups, including BLM, that in some way played a role in Ferguson street protests. While Soros reportedly was dissatisfied with the manner in which some of that money was spent, from the start he has believed in the protestors’ goals. That is why the Soros-funded Missourians Organizing for Reform and Empowerment (MORE), a rebranded branch of the now-defunct ACORN, managed to cut monthly $5,000 checks to protest organizers.

Black Lives Matter also has acquired something potentially more valuable than money over the long run: political access. Being an insider rather than remaining an outsider can yield enormous benefits. That’s why two BLM activists, DeRay McKesson and Brittany Packnett, were in attendance at the White House confab last Thursday, along with about a dozen other invited black public figures. They were there to make an impact on President Obama and his top adviser-confidante, Valerie Jarrett. In addition to Al Sharpton and others cited earlier, participants included NAACP President Cornell Brooks, NAACP Legal Defense Fund President Sherrilyn Ifill, University of Missouri student organizer DeShaunya Ware, and Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights President Wade Henderson. The event, a prelude to the annual White House gala celebration of Black History Month, gave McKesson and Packnett, both in their early 30s, an opportunity to vent. A Chicago-based Black Lives Matter activist, Aislinn Pulley, also was invited but refused to attend, believing the event was a “false narrative” that would merely provide a sound bite for the president. The meeting, she huffed, would deflect energy away from expressing solidarity with black freedom fighters.

Actually, Ms. Pulley would have felt right at home at the summit meeting, held in the Roosevelt Room of the White House. President Obama sought ideas from attendees on such subjects as police-community relations, criminal justice, voting rights, and an appropriate successor to recently deceased Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia. The meeting amounted to a sneak preview of where the administration wants to go during its remaining months. Ms. Packnett explained to Time magazine: “We had a conversation that lasted over 90 minutes. The president actually extended himself because he wanted to continue to conversation. We had a lot of opportunity to elevate various strategies that are happening on the ground as far as criminal justice reform, working on police violence, and systemic educational inequities.” In other words, it was standard Al Sharpton/Jesse Jackson boilerplate. And nobody was around to offer dissent. That was the way it was planned.

Packnett, a self-described educator, already has had a taste of access to the top. She served on the President’s Task Force on 21st Century Policing, whose final report, released last May, proposed ways to defuse tensions between police and black residents. As for DeRay McKesson, like Packnett, an educator – he’s a Teach for America alumnus and a former school administrator – early this month he declared himself a candidate for mayor of Baltimore. He’s young and inexperienced. And the field is crowded, with fully 29 candidates. But winning isn’t out of the question. McKesson is a Baltimore native. He has name recognition. And given the contents ofhis 26-page platform, it’s fair to say he is very much in synch with the city’s black majority. McKesson is nearly silent about the explosive rise in murders in his city in the aftermath of last April’s riot, yet he exercises little restraint in denouncing police who protect Baltimore from violent criminals. In addition to being a Black Lives Matter organizer, he also is the co-founder of a group known as Campaign Zero whose tag line is “We can end police violence in America.” As much as it’s hard to justify another term for the current mayor, Stephanie Rawlings-Blake (understandably not running for re-election), McKesson, a full-time professional agitator, might make things worse.

After the meeting broke up, President Obama praised the event as a necessary step toward black self-empowerment. “There’s no better way for us to celebrate Black History Month,” he said. He expressed particular gratitude toward the youth contingent; i.e., Black Lives Matter:

Overall, what I am most encouraged by is the degree of focus and seriousness and constructiveness that exists not only with existing civil rights organizations, but this new generation. They are some serious young people. I told them that they are much better organizers than I was their age, and I am confident that they are going to take America to new heights. My job is just to make sure that I’m listening to them and learning from them a little bit.

There is nothing surprising here. Obama long has held that racial inequality is very much a function of white injustice. As his tenure winds down, he has made this view more explicit, especially given the extensive criticism he has received from blacks over the years for “not doing enough.” And he has taken action lately. In February 2014, he launched an interagency initiative, My Brother’s Keeper, to steer young “men of color” away from crime. Last year, after hearing complaints from women who felt excluded, he pledged $100 million for at-risk women and girls of color. Say this for Obama: He’s inclusive.

President Obama has a partner in the Department of Justice, especially with repect to the ongoing Ferguson, Missouri saga. The DOJ, having issued an essentially worthless study last March alleging anti-black bias by Ferguson police and courts, filed a 56-page lawsuit on February 10 alleging the City of Ferguson since then has engaged in “ongoing and pervasive” violations of the rights of black suspects. The City Council the previous day had rejected a proposed DOJ consent decree that would have put the City police and court under virtual receivership. “Residents of Ferguson have suffered the deprivation of their constitutional rights – the rights guaranteed to all Americans – for decades,” remarked Attorney General Loretta Lynch. Underlying this elevated rhetoric, with its affectation of color-blind reasonableness, is a desire to compensate for the DOJ’s admitted inability to stick Officer Darren Wilson with civil rights “hate crime” charges.

Some people might defend the White House summit as simply a fact-finding mission. If so, the mission was rather monochromatic and one-sided. Its guiding assumption, that the main impediment to black progress is “institutional” (i.e., white) racism, went unchallenged. In the current age of mandated favoritism toward blacks, known alternately as “affirmative action” and “diversity,” a challenge would have been welcome. A real fact-finding mission, for example, would have invited at least one cop to the table talk. It also would have emphasized that police, especially if white, cannot effectively enforce the law if they greatly fear prosecution, a lawsuit, public vilification or death in an attempt to arrest a black suspect. The meeting further could have benefited from input from crime victims – such as business owners in Ferguson whose premises were torched in November 2014 by Black Lives Matter-inspired rioters following a grand jury’s announcement that it would not indict Officer Wilson. Such aspiring participants will have to wait for another day.

Homeland Security Says It Is Stepping Up Enforcement as it Deals With Immigrant Surge

By Dudley Althaus in Mexico City and Laura Meckler in Washington
The Wall Street Journal

Updated July 14, 2014

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Thirty eight women and children recently detained at the U.S. border were flown home to Honduras on Monday, in what U.S. officials say is the first of an expected increase in expedited deportations.

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“This is just the initial wave,” the Department of Homeland Security said in a statement. “We expect additional adults with children will be returned to Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador soon, based on the results of removal proceedings or expedited removal.”

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More than 57,000 unaccompanied minors, and thousands more young children chaperoned by parents or other adults, have flooded across the U.S.-Mexico border since October, overwhelming U.S. immigration officials and creating what President Barack Obama has called an “urgent humanitarian situation.”

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U.S. officials say the perceptions that children who make it to the U.S. can stay are encouraging more to make the dangerous journey north. They say they hope to persuade would-be migrants that this is false.

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The deportees, including 21 children aged 18 months to 15 years, were flown from El Paso, Texas, to the Honduran city of San Pedro Sula, near the country’s Caribbean coast. San Pedro and nearby cities are the top Central American source of unaccompanied minors traveling to the U.S., said an internal Department of Homeland Security study. The U.S. has deported some 82,000 Central Americans, mostly adults, since October, the agency said.

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House Republicans are expected to discuss the child-migration influx Tuesday at their weekly meeting in Washington.

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On Monday, two Texas lawmakers—Sen. John Cornyn, a Republican, and Rep. Henry Cuellar, a Democrat—said they would offer legislation to hasten deportation proceedings for Central American children who arrived in the U.S. alone. Some Republicans are pressing to tie such a change in law to approval of Mr. Obama’s request for $3.7 billion in emergency funds.

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A spokesman for House Speaker John Boehner said he had no comment on Monday’s deportations.

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U.S. law has long allowed for expedited removal proceedings for families crossing the border without authorization, just as it does for adults traveling without children. But because the government had almost no beds in facilities suitable for families as immigration surged, nearly everyone was released and ordered to report to immigration court.

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In response, the Department of Homeland Security late last month opened a temporary family detention facility that can hold 700 people in Artesia, N.M. Soon after, the U.S. began sending apprehended adults traveling with children to the center.

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The Monday deportations also are a result of the administration’s move to increase the number of immigration judges and asylum officers to process the cases faster, the Homeland Security statement said.

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Immigrant advocates argue there is no reason to fast-track these deportations and they oppose detaining families during the process. They say alternatives to detention, such as ankle bracelets, are more humane and work to assure people show up for court hearings. U.S. officials say these methods increasingly are being used as well.

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Like others in recent weeks, Monday’s deportees were greeted in San Pedro by Honduran first lady Ana García de Hernández, who is leading a task force aimed at dissuading people from leaving Honduras. In addition to the U.S. deportees, Mrs. García de Hernández met with several hundred more young migrants deported from Mexico.

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Mexico also has stepped up immigration enforcement recently on and near its porous southern border.

So far this year, Mexico has deported 48,500 Central Americans, according to the Mexican government.

Mexican Interior Minister Miguel Angel Osorio has warned that foreigners without proper visas faced deportation. He said Mexican officials would target the freight trains by which many migrants, including large numbers of teenagers, make their way to the U.S. border.

The Obama administration hopes to fund Mexico’s effort by redirecting $86 million that had been earmarked for Mexican law enforcement and justice reform under the 2007 Merida Initiative, Thomas Shannon, a senior State Department official, told Mexican reporters on Sunday. Mr. Shannon was touring the Mexico-Guatemala border on Monday.

In an interview published Monday in a Mexico City newspaper, Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernández blamed U.S. antinarcotics policy for the violence said to be driving many from his country. As Colombia and then Mexico attacked the narcotics trade, traffickers increasingly moved to Honduras, fueling violence, the president said.

Much of the violence in Honduras—as in neighboring El Salvador and Guatemala—is caused by local street gangs with a marginal connection to the international drug trade. The rival MS-13 and 18th Street gangs—both founded by Central American migrants decades ago in Los Angeles—are involved in extortion, kidnapping and other crimes in their poor neighborhoods, analysts have said.

Efforts to lessen the gangs’ violence, through enhanced enforcement or through government-brokered truces, have had only limited impact, they said.

Social workers and migrant advocates in Honduras say endemic poverty, a lack of job opportunities and the desire to reunite with parents who migrated earlier prove greater motivations for young people to leave the country than does violence.